


My Only Wish This Year

by beggars_visored



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, CHRISTMASSSS, Christmas, Four chapters, Gay, Gay Male Character, Gay Sex, Holidays, M/M, Pizza, also pizza, ho ho HO, let's do this, returning to writing, uh-huh, yes christmas yes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-12-12
Updated: 2014-12-12
Packaged: 2018-03-01 03:41:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,474
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2758244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beggars_visored/pseuds/beggars_visored
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louis Tomlinson is excited to return home for Christmas...until he gets stuck at university. Then he meets crazy model boy Harry Styles, and suddenly things don't seem too bad after all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	My Only Wish This Year

“You have got to be fucking kidding me,” Louis Tomlinson moans. He’s at the airport, bags packed and ready to go, he’s even got his Santa hat on and feeling decently festive and the fucking terminal sign has, in huge red letters, the words ALL FLIGHTS CANCELED plastered across it.

He groans and stamps his foot and no, he does not care that he looks like a three year old throwing a temper tantrum in the middle of Heathrow because his flight got canceled and he can’t get home now and everything is ruined.

He checks his phone. There it is, in glowing LED light: December 22nd, 20:40. That means that it is precisely three hours and twenty minutes until Christmas Eve Eve, which is the day when he normally begins baking exorbitant amounts of gingerbread men and blasting Mariah Carey and getting jolly and in the holiday spirit, ho ho ho and thank you very much. But no. Instead, he’s here, stuck in the airport staring in frustration at the sign with a total of six suitcases, three days til Christmas, and zero flights currently departing.

He calls his mom nearly in hysterics. She calms him down, somewhat, by telling him that it’s not the end of the world and they can delay Christmas as long as it takes for him to get home. And according to the weather report, that’s not going to be until well after the actual day.

With no other option, Louis takes his massive amount of luggage (so it’s a week’s holiday, who’s to say he doesn’t need twenty plus outfits? A boy’s gotta have choices) and stomps back to the entrance where he stands in sleet for what feels like hours, but is really just five minutes or so, trying desperately to hail a cab.

When one finally rolls up, it’s driven by an obnoxious gum-chewing middle-aged man with an eczema problem and his radio blasting the greatest hits of Wham!. So that ride goes smoothly.

And then he and his things are dumped back at his flat just outside the main part of campus and he has to drag his excessive amount of luggage up several flights of stairs until he reaches his flat and then remembers that he left his key in the back of the cab, spends a few minutes sitting on the stairs and crying, and remembering that there is a spare under the mat downstairs. It’s still there; at least something went right.

After letting himself inside and dropping his bags off, a now haggard and tired Louis Tomlinson pours himself some vodka (well, he actually just drinks from the bottle, but that’s a side note) and sits down to brood on his current situation.

So, he finished his final exams and was all ready to go home and spend a relaxing holiday with Lottie and Fizz and Daisy and Phoebe, decorating the tree and wrapping presents and baking cookies…so many cookies…and just being in the Christmas spirit but instead had his flight canceled and is now spending Christmas in his uni flat. Alone.

Not that spending holidays alone is anything new to Louis. After all, New Year’s Eve, Valentine’s Day, Saint Patrick’s Day, and every other holiday under the sun is spent by himself with a bottle of something strong and a Jane Austen novel. But Christmas is different. At least on Christmas he’s alone with his family, doing things that make him feel like a part of something special. Now he’s alone alone. And it kinda really sucks.

Downing the last of the bottle, Louis pads over to the sink in his socks and goes to put the empty container in the recycling when he drops it and it shatters all over the floor. He debates just taking his socks off and walking over top of the broken glass to top off this beautiful day, but settles instead for sweeping it up.

He spends some time watching telly, but there’s nothing good on, and then goes through way too many takeaway menus looking for what he wants for dinner, eventually deciding that he might as well go walk outside in the sleet and see what’s open rather than face the additional rejection of calling various places and getting a cheery voicemail.

So he puts on his boots and his heavy jacket, scarf, and hat, shoves his hands in his pockets, and departs the flat for the eatery section of town. He forgets to lock the door, so he goes back and does that. Nothing like a false start.

It’s snowing/raining/icing/puking/whatever the fuck the weather is doing really hard at this point, and a few times, Louis has to be careful about where he’s walking in order to make sure he doesn’t walk into the street or into a pole. Which happens often when it’s sunny and he’s sober. Neither one of those things exists at the moment, which makes the possibility greater and less funny.

He walks one block, and then another, and then another, and just when he’s about to give up, he sees one of those cheap pizzerias open with its neon sign saying YUM! PIZZA! flashing every two seconds and he decides it’s better than risking another block and goes inside.

Instantly, he’s hit with a blast of ridiculously hot air that makes everything in him feel like it’s been lit on fire. He shucks every layer of outerwear that he has on, including his sweater, leaving him in just a t-shirt. The Spice Girls’ version of “Christmas Wrapping” is playing quite loudly on the tinny radio resting precariously on a stack of pizza boxes behind the counter. There’s nobody in the restaurant, which is too small to hold anyone more than two people, and Louis senses that the radio is constantly competing with the humming soda machine for sonic dominance.

Just when he’s about to start searching behind the counter for some sort of food stuff, a curly-haired boy peeks out from behind the doorway leading into the kitchen. “Be right with ya, mate!” he shouts, disappearing again before Louis can say anything.

“Take your time,” Louis responds half-heartedly, sitting down at the one table and staring out the font window. Not that there are any others. But still, it makes it seem less claustrophobic than it actually is.

Doing a full assessment of his surroundings, he notices that everything is framed in slightly sad looking garlands and there are ornaments with the boys from Take That (Everything Changes era) on a brown tree next to the soda machine. He’s sensing a pattern of sadness and death. Yay Christmas. He rubs his eyes wearily and settles for drawing figure eights on the tabletop until he’s interrupted by a “Alright, mate, how can I help ya?”

Looking up at the intruder, he’s stunned because in front of him stands the most beautiful boy he’s ever seen in his entire life.

Chestnut brown curls tucked lazily behind a stained bandana frame his angelic face. High cheekbones, taught eyebrows, eyelashes like a giraffe. _He could be a model_ , Louis thinks. _What if he is a model? But then why would a model be working in a sad pizza joint?_

Ignoring the discussion that just took place in his head, Louis continues his study of handsome pizza guy. Those cheekbones point to perfectly luscious lips, not too big, but just full enough that Louis wants nothing more than to kiss them until they flush red. His sharp chin and the dip of his shirt to reveal his collarbone, tightly cut angles that make something inside Louis stir that he hasn’t felt before (okay well since the day before when he was whacking off but that doesn’t sound nearly as romantic).

And the shirt, that bloody brilliant shirt, hugs him in the most perfect yet most horrible way possible and sends Louis’ eyes down to those impossibly tight jeans and god, Louis wishes he had x-ray vision to see what was behind them. There’s just a hint of a Calvin Klein waistband peeking out above. Good god. Louis’ throat goes dry.

“Sorry, I’m not on the menu,” model boy says wryly, reminding Louis that he is in fact in public and, worse, is standing directly in front of the individual that he was mentally. Louis reddens to the approximate shade of a sun-dried tomato. Or, like, several thousand.

“I’m sorry,” Louis says through a throat thick with something he can’t identify (lust? He can’t honestly tell) and remembers to keep breathing and focuses instead on the boy’s shoes as he tries to come up with an order. “What are your specials?” he finally asks.

Model boy looks at him with raised eyebrows. Louis looks at him like a deer in headlights. “Uh, do you- I mean, well -”

“Oh if you want the specials, you’re going to get the specials,” model boy says. Louis stares. “We’ve got a Mele Kalikimaka, which is a pizza with pineapples, ham, and a side of something else Hawaiian which I cannot for the life of me remember, a Figgy Pudding Pie, which is basically barbecue chicken pizza with spinach, which like, gross, a North Pole Special, which is every topic known to mankind in a pizza turnover, and our very exclusive Elf On A Shelf which is tomatoes, brie cheese, and artichokes and a paper thin crust. Very popular.”

Louis gapes. This boy cannot exist. It’s physically impossible.

“Uh,” he says after a minute. Model boy does not break eye contact. “Can I just have cheese?”

Model boy groans. “Jesus fucking christ, mate,” he says, grabbing the menu from Louis’ hands, “if I knew you were gonna be that basic I’d have given you a pumpkin spice latte and a doggy bag.”

Louis does not know what to say. He thinks he’s in love.

After several minutes of awkwardness, in which Louis tries not to stare and model boy is singing along in a slightly off tune fashion to Karen Carpenter’s rendition of “Merry Christmas, Darling”, he is given his pizza. Louis smiles at model boy and prepares to eat when the chair across from him is pulled out with a scrape and model boy sits down across from him and stares.

Louis is frozen. He cannot move. He just wants to eat, and yet he cannot. This isn’t fair.

“Why were you staring at me?” model boy asks, not breaking eye contact. Louis sits for a minute and finally snaps back into focus, taking a piece from the pie and putting it on a paper plate.

“You’re really weird,” he says finally, because it seems like the only thing he can say which is both true and slightly stupid. Model boy thinks about this for a second and nods.

“Mind if I have some?” he asks, taking a piece from the pie and biting into it.

“Uh,” is all that Louis can say before he decides it’s just smarter to let model boy do what he wants with his pizza. And his heart. Cut that into eight little slices, why don’t you, with those sharp cheekbones.

“I can’t believe you ordered cheese,” model boy says, taking a bite of the crust.

“I can’t believe you just took part of my pizza,” Louis says in an even tone before taking another slice.

“I made it, it’s my right to eat it,” model boy says in return, grabbing another slice from the pie and shoving almost the entire thing into his mouth.

“You’re crazy, model boy,” Louis says, half to himself, but model boy puts the pizza on his plate and stares at Louis, even when he reaches across the table for a napkin and begins wiping his fingers with it.

“Did you just call me model boy?” he asks with a tone that Louis can’t identify as being amused or offended. Louis kind of gapes at him like a fish out of water, unsure of what to say, before model boy extends his hand. “Name’s Harry. Styles. Harry Styles. That’s my full name, I mean,” model boy now identified as Harry Styles says.

Louis takes his hand and shakes it. “I’m Louis Tomlinson,” he says.

“Why’d you call me model boy?” Harry asks, not letting go of his hand.

“Because you have nice cheekbones, I guess,” Louis says, trying to take his hand back.

“You think I have nice cheekbones?” Harry asks, holding firm.

“Yeah, you have nice cheekbones, Harry,” Louis says, tugging a little harder on his own hand to get it back.

“What else do I have that you think is nice?” Harry asks in a tone that is perfectly innocent yet completely suggestive.

Louis hits the napkin dispenser with his elbow and it falls onto the floor with a resounding crash. Harry lets go of his hand and reaches down to grab it, Louis retracting his hand and nervously rubbing it on his pant leg. This whole thing is really weird. And also really sexual, for reasons that he still doesn’t quite understand.

“Sorry,” Louis says after Harry’s returned to his normal seated, staring position.

“Oh, don’t apologize to me,” Harry says, pointing to the napkin dispenser. “Apologize to him.”

Louis looks at the napkin dispenser, and then at Harry, whose face is completely serious, and then back down at the dispenser, before Harry breaks into a hearty laugh and claps him on the arm. “I’m kidding mate, didn’t want ya thinking I’m a real loony or anything!” he says.

Louis laughs somewhat awkwardly because he’s not sure whether or not he gets the joke or whether he is the joke. “Anyway, you want the rest of this to go?” Harry asks, standing up. Louis smiles at him and nods, and Harry picks up the remainder of the pizza and goes behind the counter to get it boxed up. Louis sits and waits patiently as Harry goes about his business, humming that one Coldplay song about Christmas. He emerges from behind the counter, some short minutes later, with a box and attached receipt, and places it on the table before Louis.

“There you go,” he says. “I added the pieces we ate cause I didn’t want you to go hungry or anything. It’s like the snowpocalypse out there.” Walking back to where he came from, Harry does a one-handed side vault over the counter and disappears into the back room with a “Catch you later, Tomlinson”.

Louis waves before he remembers that Harry can’t see him and then gives up altogether. Looking down at the receipt to see how much he owes, he sees that the receipt is really just a blank piece of paper with a phone number and the words “Call me” with a winky face on it.

Louis thinks he might pass out.

**Author's Note:**

> ho ho ho merry christmas xox


End file.
